Over a tenth of UK foreign aid spent on climate-related projects since 2010 has been channelled through consultancies, a new Carbon Brief investigation reveals.
This equates to at least £2.11bn being channelled through management consultancies, including PwC and KPMG. This private consultancies government foreign aid figure will shock many, but might not come as a great surprise.
Analysed
Josh Gabbatiss analysed 25,000+ transactions listed on government web pages and found more than £2bn has been handed to dozens of these companies since 2010.
You can see his dedication to this when he posted: “NEW: I’ve spent a year investigating the cash the UK spends on climate action in developing countries 💰🌍
“An FOI revealed the government is veering off track from a pledge to spend £11.6bn over 5 years.
“Spending now needs to double in the coming years.”
Private consultancies government foreign aid
Experts tell Carbon Brief there is opposition among some developing countries to climate aid being funnelled first through foreign consultancies rather than disbursed directly via local actors.
Saleemul Huq, director of the International Centre for Climate Change and Development in Bangladesh, said: “There is a long history of sending international consultants to developing countries to assist in tackling climate change, which have not resulted in any real benefits after the international consultants leave the country.”
They shared a list of the companies who have been give climate funds and wrote: “Companies such as KPMG, PwC and Adam Smith International have received hundreds of millions of pounds from the UK to run climate projects overseas. Nearly all of these companies are based in the UK and other global-north countries.”
One response to the report read: “Hardly rocket science but climate funding works best when invested directly in local communities. So why since 2010 had #FCDO channelled over £2bn of UK climate aid through consultancies? Paying for expensive consultants delivering fly in/fly out action?”
He added: “As a developing government official once said to me “why do donors insist in hiring foreign consultants, they arrive and ask to borrow your watch and then have the cheek of charging you, to tell you the time”!!”
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